Operating Systems
10 free questions with worked answers, and 320 more in the full bank.
Free questions
What is the primary purpose of Safe Mode in Windows?
1 mark · Easy
Which of the following is an example of an operating system?
1 mark · Easy
Which command is used to list files and directories in Linux?
1 mark · Easy
Which Linux command is used to record a user login session in a file?
1 mark · Easy
Which file system is commonly used on Windows operating system?
1 mark · Easy
What is the main function of an operating system?
1 mark · Easy
Which of the following is a Linux distribution?
1 mark · Easy
What should you do before upgrading the operating system on a user's computer?
3 marks · Medium
Which command would you use to restart a Windows computer from the Command Prompt?
3 marks · Medium
Which tool would you use to check for disk errors in Windows?
4 marks · Hard
More Operating Systems questions (page 3 of 6)
Answers and explanations are in the full bank.
- What is the main job of an operating system? · 1 mark
- Which part of an operating system stays loaded in memory and directly controls the processor, memory and devices? · 1 mark
- Why does a crash in an ordinary application usually leave Windows running, while a faulty driver can cause a blue screen? · 2 marks
- A program needs to read a file, but it is not allowed to access the disk controller directly. What does it do instead? · 3 marks
- What does a device driver do? · 1 mark
- What is the difference between a program and a process? · 2 marks
- A browser uses several threads to download a page, draw it and respond to clicks. How do threads differ from separate processes? · 3 marks
- A single-core processor appears to run a browser, a music player and a word processor at the same time. How? · 2 marks
- When the scheduler moves the processor from one process to another, it saves the first process's registers and program counter and loads those of the second. What is this called? · 2 marks
- In some older systems, one badly written program that never gave up the processor could freeze the whole computer. What do modern operating systems use to prevent this? · 3 marks
- Which processor scheduling method gives each ready process a fixed time slice in turn, then moves it to the back of the queue? · 2 marks
- Process A holds the printer and waits for the scanner, while process B holds the scanner and waits for the printer. Neither can continue. What is this situation? · 2 marks
- In a priority scheduler, a low-priority job never runs because higher-priority jobs keep arriving. Which technique solves this? · 3 marks
- When a key is pressed, the keyboard controller signals the processor to pause its current work and deal with the key. What is this signal called? · 1 mark
- A PC with 8 GB of RAM is running programs that together need 10 GB. How does Windows cope? · 2 marks
- A program touches memory that Windows had moved out to the disk earlier. What happens next? · 3 marks
- A PC with too little RAM spends most of its time moving pages between memory and disk; the disk light stays on and programs barely respond. What is this condition called? · 3 marks
- An officer loses an unsaved report when the power suddenly cuts. Why? · 1 mark
- A PC has 8 GB of RAM installed, but the 32-bit edition of Windows on it reports only about 3.2 GB usable. Why? · 2 marks
- After moving to 64-bit Windows, an old scanner stops working, and the 32-bit driver from its original CD will not install. What is needed? · 2 marks
- An application's memory use grows steadily for days until the server slows down, and restarting the application frees the memory again. What is the likely cause? · 2 marks
- A user connects a new USB mouse to a Windows PC, and it works within seconds without any setup disk. Which feature made this possible? · 1 mark
- What is the main difference between a command-line interface and a graphical user interface? · 1 mark
- In an operating system, what is the shell? · 2 marks
- Which kind of operating system is designed to react to events within a fixed, guaranteed deadline, as in an aircraft or medical device controller? · 3 marks
- In what order do these steps normally happen when a PC is switched on? · 2 marks
- A new 4 TB disk is initialised with the MBR partition style, and Windows can only use about 2 TB of it. What should have been chosen? · 3 marks
- A technician using the MBR partition style cannot create a fifth primary partition on a disk. Why? · 2 marks
- A technician wants to install Windows from a bootable USB drive, but the PC keeps starting the old system from its hard disk. What should they do? · 1 mark
- After Ubuntu is installed alongside Windows on a laptop, a menu appears at every start asking which system to load. Which component shows this menu? · 2 marks
- A driver update says a restart is needed. The user chooses Shut down, then switches on again the next morning, but the change still has not taken effect. Why? · 3 marks
- Windows fails to start twice in a row, and on the third attempt a blue “Automatic Repair” screen appears with advanced options. What environment is this? · 2 marks
- Copying a 6 GB video onto a flash drive fails with “The file is too large for the destination file system”, although the drive has 20 GB free. Why? · 2 marks
- Which file system is the best choice for an external drive that must hold files larger than 4 GB and be read and written on both Windows and macOS? · 2 marks
- Which file system is used for the Windows system drive and supports file permissions, encryption and journaling? · 1 mark
- A server loses power in the middle of writing files. When it restarts, the NTFS or ext4 volume is consistent within seconds instead of needing a long full check. What made this possible? · 3 marks
- On a volume with 4 KB clusters, a folder holds 1,000 text files of 100 bytes each. About how much disk space do they occupy? · 3 marks
- Which file system is the default for many Linux distributions, such as Ubuntu and Debian? · 1 mark
- Which file system do current Macs use for their internal drive? · 1 mark
- On an old office PC with a mechanical hard disk, files have become scattered in many pieces across the disk, slowing it down. Which Windows tool helps? · 1 mark
- Why does Windows not defragment a solid-state drive in the traditional way? · 2 marks
- Which of these is an absolute path on Windows? · 1 mark
- A web application works on a developer's Windows laptop but fails on the Linux server with “file not found” for Logo.PNG, although logo.png exists. What is the cause? · 2 marks
- A Windows user moving to Linux asks where the D: drive for their second disk has gone. How does Linux present additional disks? · 3 marks
- On a Linux server, in which directory are system-wide configuration files, such as those for services and network settings, normally kept? · 2 marks
- On Linux, a symbolic link and a hard link are made to the same file, and then the original file name is deleted. What happens? · 3 marks
- A user encrypts a folder through its Properties → Advanced → “Encrypt contents to secure data” option. Later their account is deleted and recreated, and the files can no longer be opened. What went wrong? · 3 marks
- A clerk deletes a report from a mapped network drive and then looks for it in the Recycle Bin on their PC, but it is not there. Why? · 2 marks
- Windows refuses to delete a spreadsheet, saying “The action can't be completed because the file is open in Excel”. What should the user do? · 1 mark
- A second internal disk is fitted to a PC, but it does not appear in File Explorer. Disk Management shows it as “Not Initialized” and “Unallocated”. What must be done? · 2 marks
- On a fresh Windows 11 installation, what is the state of the built-in account named “Administrator”? · 2 marks
- What is the difference between a local user account and a domain user account on a Windows PC? · 2 marks
- A user signs in to a personal Windows laptop with an Outlook.com email address instead of a local account. What does this Microsoft account add? · 1 mark
- After signing in, a user sees “You've been signed in with a temporary profile”. Their desktop is empty, and files saved there vanish at sign-out. What is the likely cause? · 3 marks
- Twelve accountants need the same access to five shared folders. What is the best way to grant it? · 1 mark
- A folder is shared with Everyone set to Read in the share permissions, while its NTFS permissions give the HR group Modify. What can an HR officer do when opening it over the network? · 3 marks
- A new subfolder created inside the Finance folder automatically receives the same permissions as Finance. What NTFS behaviour is this? · 2 marks
- A user belongs to two groups: Staff has Allow Modify on a folder, and Interns has an explicit Deny Write on the same folder. Can the user save changes to files there? · 3 marks
- A confidential file readable only by the director is copied into a Public folder on the same NTFS volume. Who can now read the copy? · 3 marks
- A small office has six PCs in a workgroup. As it grows to 80 PCs, why would it move to a domain? · 2 marks